Background Information
After you Baseline a project and begin tracking actual progress, you should never delete a Baselined task. Deleting a Baselined task is not good practice, as it generates negative variance that you cannot possibly track or analyze in your project in the absence of the deleted task. You project might show under budget on both Work and Cost, but you have no way of knowing WHY it is underbudget! A better practice is to cancel an unneeded task using the methodology described below.
Resolution
To cancal an unstarted task that is no longer needed in the project, complete the following steps:
1. Click View > Table > Work and set the Remaining Work value to 0 hours for the task you want to cancel.
Notice that because the Duration of the task is now 0 days, Microsoft Project displays the Gantt Chart symbol for the cancelled task as the Milestone symbol (black diamond).
2. Click View > Table > Entry to return to the Entry table.
3. Double-click the cancelled task to open the Task Information dialog.
4. On the General tab, the % Complete value to 100%.
5. On the Notes tab, add a task Note to document the reason for cancelling the task, and then click the OK button.
6. In the Gantt Chart, double-click the Milestone symbol for the cancelled task.
7. In the Format Bar dialog, click the Shape pick list and choose the Solid Circle symbol (or any other symbol you want to use).
8. In the Format Bar dialog, click the Color pick list and choose the Green color (or any other color you want to use), and then click the OK button.
Notice that the cancelled task now shows a unique symbol in the Gantt Chart. If you cancel other tasks, be sure to use the same Gantt Chart symbol for all cancelled tasks. If you would like to show the word "Cancelled " to the right of the Gantt Chart symbol, complete these additional steps:
1. Right-click on the Duration column header and choose the Insert Column item on the shortcut menu.
2. In the Column Definition dialog, select the Text1 field and click the OK button.
3. In the Text1 column, type the word Cancelled for the cancelled task.
4. In the Gantt Chart, double-click the symbol for the cancelled task.
5. In the Format Bar dialog, click the Bar Text tab.
6. In the Format Bar dialog, click the pick list in the field for the Right item and choose the Text1 field.
7. Click the OK button.
8. Right-click on the Text1 column header and choose the Hide Column item on the shortcut menu.
Note: In steps #2 and #6 in the preceding set of steps, you can use any available custom Text field, but be sure to use the same Text field in BOTH steps.